Face a Face

Ingmar Bergman's films always had, or at least, most of them had, a very dark and almost horror-ish tone to them, particularly films such as "Persona" and "The Seventh Seal", both which I consider among the finest films ever made. It was no surprise that his two 'official' horror films - this one and the slightly superior "Hour of the Wolf", come across as being not only of the genre's finest, but also one of the scariest of all time. Liv Ullman gives a breathtaking performance of a psychiatrist who turns out to be just as crazy as the people she takes care of. We follow her as she is lost in the hellish labyrinth of her subconscious, and harassed by horrible demons she created herself. Meanwhile, on the outside world, her 'darker side' takes over, and her friend and co-worker, played by the great Erland Josephson, tries to save her. Ullman's gradual descent into insanity is jaw-dropping, and here she gives her most twisted, hysterical performances for the likes of Isabelle Adjani in "Possession" and Catherine Denueve in "Repulsion". For the acting and Bergman's superb direction alone the film manages to convey a sense of dread and fear unlike anything Hollywood had done to this point, and indeed, the film does make the majority of American horror films made at that time look stupid in comparison. Overall, 10/10. A masterpiece.

Face to face is another example of Swedish director Ingmar Bergman's masterful direction in order to penetrate into his actors' psyche. Bergman's sole intention in his movies is to convey the emotions, the interaction between different personalities and how they swift in the film. He uses long uninterrupted takes in such effect that many times throughout the film someone could get carried away and find itself present in the room with the protagonists. It's like Sven Nykvist forgets the camera somewhere recording, but the action continues... Bergman's usual partners are present obviously in Face to Face. Aformentioned cinematographer Sven Nykvist (who by the way has won two Oscars for Bergman's "Fanny & Alexander" and "Cries and Whispers" and was nominated for "face to face", does again superb job. But in my opinion the film is worth viewing mostly for Liv Ullmann's extraordinary performance, mominated for an Oscar as well. There is nothing that I could add, Bergman fans will find the master here in peak form. I hope all film fans will one day discover Ingmar Bergman's cinema, it would be an unpreceded experience. Better late than never...

I saw this with friends when it was first released and twenty minutes after we had left the cinema we realized that no one had spoken. This is a masterful film with Liv Ullman's performance eclipsing any seen on screen. You feel the pain, the hurt and the confusion as you watch this woman's journey. A film for those who like intense, thought provoking and intelligent story telling.

No director came ever close to Ingmar Bergman when it came to a mystical and psychological approach of human condition. Bergmanian faces faced the impending doom of mortality whilst they shielded their soul from the cries and whispers of a devouring subconscious, pandering to puritan and suffocating bourgeois-like formalism. The existential dilemma relied on whether to rebel against God, society or yourself? And how can an individual voice ever make itself heard amidst the deafening silence of God and the internal vacarm that govern it.

From such heavy-handed interrogations, "Face to Face" is certainly a most ambitious project from Bergman, maybe too ambitious from the way he got carried away by an excess of symbolism. The film chronicles the emotional journey of a substitute psychiatrist named Jenny Isaakson (Liv Ullman), a wife and mother, alone during summer vacation (while her husband is at a Congress in Chicago and her 14-year old daughter in a riding camp). Jenny stays at her grandparents' house that revives some haunting memories and fuels rather disturbing nightmares, one consisting of a sinister one-eyed old woman (Tore Dyveke Segelcke).

Here you've got all types of troubles packed into the vulnerable soul of one woman; marital, psychological, existential, all sorts of relationship in fact, making ironic the way she was deemed by Erland Josephson (Dr. Tomas Jakobi) as "a miracle of mental health". If anything, the film invites us to contemplate that even behind the balanced posture of normal and well-spoken people, you might find an inclination to violent breakdowns. Beware the silent ones indeed and the 'suicide attempt' occurring in the film seems more plausible than if it was from someone vocal about it. All credit goes to Ullman who delivers the performance of a lifetime, similar to Gena Rowlands in "A Woman Under the Influence", a woman entrapped in her own inhibitions while tortured by devilish thoughts and painful memories.

So "Face to Face" is never as powerful and poignant as when it keeps a shadow of mystery for we can read in Liv Ullman's face the gentleness of a woman with delicate features but whose sad eyes keep yelling for help. Jenny never seems to act but her unhappiness is as plain as the crisped smiles and hesitations she puts on her attempt to reassure her entourage that "everything's all right". Her pampering grandmother (Alno Taube) can see that something's not right with her husband, a wife can tell, her own husband (Gunnar Björnstrand who sadly lost his prestance) is nearing death and has only a few words in this films but what words: "old age is hell". People can read in Jenny and even a neurotic patient Maria (Karl Sylwan) gazes at her, touches her eyes and front, and says in a very laconic way "Poor Jenny". That scene exudes "Persona" vibes where the observer becomes the object of uncompromising scrutiny.

Yet the mirror-like duality induced with Maria is barely explored by Bergman who was getting lucid about the futility of therapy, something echoed by Jenny's colleague who declared "I don't think we can cure one person, maybe one or two despite our efforts", the violence of the psychiatric methods are more or less perceived as an invasion of intimacy, a symbolical rape (so to speak) almost foreshadowed by Maria's bruised face. At some point Jenny says that she's somewhat happy because she's made herself safe and sound the illusion of stability and happiness are the closest to a placebo preventing toxic feelings or past traumas to emotionally cripple you. But the more you internalize anger, the more likely you turn your psyche into an emotional grenade. It's all a matter of when will the pin be pulled out?

After having dinner with Tomas, Jenny goes to his house, he starts a flirting approach that she cancels almost instantly, asking him "how you figured out overcoming the awkwardness of getting undressed". This awkward exchange is my favorite moment, reminding how great chemistry the two actors had in "Scenes from a Marriage", it's obvious they are lonely and disilussioned and found a channel of mutual appreciation but somehow Jenny can't let herself be conquered. Naturally, it's not the rebuttal to put in the equation but a subconscious parellel Jenny draws between her body intimacy and her intimate secrets, as if the body wasn't a temple of pleasure but a sarcophage where mummified torments were preserved.

The body and soul dichotomy is inexistant within Jenny as illustrated in the disturbing rape attempt scene. The man who assaults Jenny gives up, later she confesses that she somehow wanted to be aroused through a pain that would make her feel alive, but it was all "dry" and "tight" indeed. Jenny had reached a no-return point where the body and the soul made one and but the desecration of the body is still the lesser of two evils, making the suicide a most natural final step. Why would she choose to have a platonic relationship with Tomas might speak higher of her opinion about him, the less he tries to get inside her literally, the more inclined she is to open the sarcophage and reveal how the darkest secrets of her upbringing in one of the most intense breakdown scenes ever.

"Face to Face" is the study of a woman who has let her body and her mind slip into a semi-catatonic state of illusory normality, treasuring known horrors for the unknown might be the worse. Which takes me to the film's main problem: why not keep the unknown unseen? Bergman's punctuates the film with too many surreal sequences that generate more confusion than cohesion and don't add much to what Ullman's monologues or eyes can convey. For a film so sober and intellectually rich, so horrific and yet optimistic, it's a shame that Bergman got carried away by the subject. Both him and Ullman would be Oscar-nominated but it might be one of the rare times where the actress outperformed the director.

Hey, it's Bergman PLUS Liv Ullmann, the greatest actress on the planet, and she's playing a psychiatric doctor who is slowly but very surely going wholly bonkers. Scenes carry depth and anxiety and a sense that things can come apart even when things seem serene - and when it gains momentum near the end, it's a wonder to behold. What's not to love?

Actually, I will be critical of one scene - in the 2nd half of the film, Bergman puts Jenny, his protagonist, into a double-state (hey, why not when it's a psychological thing) as she is about to, and does, a suicide attempt and recovers in the hospital and then goes into dream states. Most of these dream scenes are effective in depicting a mind at battle with itself and the personal demons of old coming back in full force (two such scenes are when Jenny confronts her parents, a back and forth *true* Love/Hate scene that is staggering, and another where she is surrounded by her patients in a room, one of them her grandfather who says flat out he's afraid of dying, to which she responds 'Just count to ten, and if you're still alive... count to ten again', which is great).

However, there is a scene that is very heavy-handed to me - yes, even for Bergman - where he has his leading lady see herself in a casket, the casket is closed shut as she is yelling and banging on the door, and then the casket is set on fire as Outside Jenny laughs. To me, this just made me go "Really, Ingmar, you're gonna go there?" But that's nitpicking when in the midst of a master at work, and boyo-boy it is a master at a career peak - given a boost by Ullmann, who starts out pretty sweet and 'normal', and then her character goes through a traumatic event (an attempted rape), but we learn that this is not even what makes her go insane - far from it, that's just the icing on the Crazy Cake. As Bergman delves deep into this woman's psychosis, it reveals how harrowing it can get, but also, ultimately, how important it is to live and to try to find some semblance of peace. Love, ultimately, is the goal, to find some caring and harmony in life while we're here.

If nothing else, the scene where Ullmann finally unloads her personal and mental baggage on a bewildered but patient and understanding Erland Josephsson should've gotten her TEN Oscars by itself. I rarely say this, but God bless Liv Ullmann, and Dog bless Ingmar Bergman. ;)